


Addiction - An Insider's Tale.

by cuddlepuss



Category: Gerard Way - Fandom, Mikey Way - Fandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: AA, Addiction, Alcohol Abuse, Alcoholism, Drug Addiction, Gen, Hospital, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-11
Updated: 2015-11-11
Packaged: 2018-05-01 03:14:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5189987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlepuss/pseuds/cuddlepuss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The recitation of the trying times of Mikey Way, as he goes though alcoholism and drug addiction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Addiction - An Insider's Tale.

**Author's Note:**

> I borrowed Mikey Way's name for this largely apocryphal tale. Not entirely untrue though, just not him.
> 
> Some of the details are loosely based on friends of mine who, through mutual drug and drink habits, and anger issues, had their daughter legally removed from them.

"Hello, my name is Mikey, and I'm an alcoholic...." These words were to start one of the hardest roads I would ever have to tread. Let me explain.  
You would probably recognise me, if you did, as the sombre faced bassist in the rock band My Chemical Romance, but that's not where it starts, our story starts years before we ever even thought to start a band, way back when we were kids.

We had a tough childhood, my brother and I, in a place where we we're rocking before rock was in fashion. Picked on and bullied for most of our lives, we had few friends apart from each other. I'm not making excuses, just stating facts, We were stupid, but at the time it seemed our only way out of a situation that at times verged on  
unbearable.

It started at school, the bullying, beatings, catcalling and such, and all we ever wanted was to be ourselves, but we were too different to fit in to a small town society that despised differences. So it started with a few drinks after a hard day's being bullied and ignored by teachers. We got into the hard stuff, nicked dad's bourbon, lied about our ages to buy vodka when that ran out, played all the tricks in the book to get the alcohol we needed to forget our problems for a few hours.

Inevitably, maybe, things started slipping, grades, behaviour, temper, attendance, even appearance. We were on the slippery slope, if we did but realise it at the time, it would have been so much easier if we had.... Anyway, at school, we'd go register, then go to our hiding place and down the booze we smuggled in our bags, I know, it sounds like we were together in this, we weren't, we just did the same things individually, it wasn't until years later that, comparing notes, we came upon the same stories, similar timelines, both existing in our own separate hells, unknowing of the others problems, lost in our own as we were. Maybe if we'd noticed each other's struggles, we wouldn't have ended up where we did. So, drinking at school, staggering out, slightly tipsy, at the end of the school day to stagger home, and drink some more. It carried on throughout my school days, getting gradually more immune to the effects, needing more and more to get the same buzz, that feeling of joyful care-freeness that made such a change from the true facts of my life.

The truth was, of course, that I was getting to be a drunk. Yes, that was me, teenage drunk, angry, maudlin, and moody. I didn't care what anyone thought or said, felt, or even if they spoke to me at all, I'd got my best friend, the bottle, to help me through the day. That was when things got worse, when I was drunk. I was doing my usual carefully paced 'I'm not drunk' stagger up the road from school, when this guy I vaguely recognised came over to say he'd something he thought I'd like to try. In my drunken state I didn't question what it might be, or why he wanted me to try it, I just went with it, hell it was the first time in years anyone had shown an interest in being with me, and I guess it touched something I wasn't even aware of feeling. The desire for a friend to talk to. Of course, that's not what he wanted, I was a teenage drunk, all attitude and no sense, in short, an easy target. He got me trying, 'experimenting' with different drugs, I was soon hooked, addicted to them as well as the drink. God, was I a mess, no self respect, no need for anyone, no need for myself. I could lose myself in the feelings of euphoria that the drink and drugs brought on, and life didn't seem so bad.

I didn't start to see sense until one of my new 'friends' died from the very substances I was using, even then, it was only a vague unease, so easily ignored in the haze of good feelings the drugs inspired. Then another died, and I started to question my actions. Even then, I wasn't so much concerned as wondering why. I was such a screw up, life meant nothing, not even my own. Then things started to change. I didn't notice at first, it crept up on me slowly, the highs weren't as high any more, I was feeling poorly after I came to. Turns out that he'd changed supplier, and it was mixed with all kinds of crap now, baby powder, talc, flour, kitchen cleanser, you name it, god knows what was in that shit, but I'd been pumping the stuff into my system for months, landed in hospital from poisoning, some of the 'additives' were not meant for consumption, but we weren't people to them, just profit and loss margins, expendable, useless, waste.

Waking in hospital, god I've never known pain like it, f*ck man it hurt. Every breath, even sweating was a new agony to my pain racked body, I hardly knew who I was anymore, never mind what I was, or how I ended up there. Apart from the pain, I only have the vaguest memories of that time, fleeting images of my mom, crying at my bedside, my brother, ashen faced as he looks down on my pallid, useless body. Fretful whimpers, like a small child in a thunderstorm escaped me as I looked into his face. I was a physical and mental wreck, and all the counselling and therapy didn't help. I just couldn't connect with the world or anything else in it anymore. Nothing had any value or meaning for me. 

Funny thing is, it was a counsellor that ultimately did, accidentally, come up with the solution. Talking to mom, she found that I'd always loved the guitar, and signed me into a therapy course in music. Pht, therapy, load of psycobable bullshit, or so I thought. I went to group sessions, more for mom than for me, and met a couple of amazing players, not in therapy, giving assistance to the people running the course, you may know them, they go by Ray Toro and Frank Iero. Anyway, Gerard came to collect me one day, half an hour early, sat in on the session, and started singing along to some of the stuff we were playing. That's were the band really started, I guess.

Anyway, I cutting out loads of stuff, and I don't know if you want to hear it or not, but, when I came out of hospital, I found Gerard had been in a similar, though less advanced form of addiction, and was in therapy also. Mom moved us to another part of town, away from our usual hangouts, so we were less likely to be found again, and put all her energies into helping her sons get over the hells we put ourselves into. God it was tough, really tough, and if not for mom and Gerard, I probably wouldn't have made it. We were always there for the other, when one was down, the other was there to help them back up... at least, Gerard was there for me, I hope I was there for him too, I think I was. Pain and cravings were the worst, the need for a fix, so bad it felt like you were going to die from the pain of it. F*ck, man, the sheer hell of watching your brother go through it, while you were yourself, you can't imagine how that amplified the things you were feeling yourself. I don't know that we ever acknowledged just HOW bad things got, in front of the other, wanted to protect Gerard from the sheer bloody nightmare of pain and f*ck that my life descended into.

But, as time went by, and you got used to not even taking an aspirin for a headache, for fear of restarting the addiction, I found myself despising myself for the weak coward I had been. That in turn lead to the depression that I battle to this day. I still have problems with liking myself, and the only time I'm truly free is when I have my guitar in my hand, and I pound out the bass to some kickass tracks, alone or in the band. So, yes, My name is Mikey, and I WAS an alcoholic."


End file.
